SI.com presents: Opposing scouts view on the Raptors

Decent detail and some optimism. Opposing scouts should be the ones who really know (unlike the media and GMs), who tend to focus more on certain aspects (media = titles and awards, GM's = players on their own team and players who fit their ideal mold, but told to them by scouts).

Not going to comment a lot, but there seemed to be more optimism on Derozan than what I would have thought.

I think the bigger question is why do people even care about the division? This is the NBA not NFL or MLB. Only the winners of the division get any advantage.

We play a not completely but still slightly unbalanced schedule (at least within the conference). That means that while the Hawks may play the Heat one more time than us, they will likely play the bobcats, wizards and magic at least three more times. That might not be much but as we often see. ahem...Harrison Barnes...ahem, the end of the season often comes down to percentage points.

We play a not completely but still slightly unbalanced schedule (at least within the conference). That means that while the Hawks may play the Heat one more time than us, they will likely play the bobcats, wizards and magic at least three more times. That might not be much but as we often see. ahem...Harrison Barnes...ahem, the end of the season often comes down to percentage points.

The unbalanced schedule could be in interesting variable in the playoff hunt too, as it pertains to the Raptors (and the entire Atlantic division). Assuming Miami, Boston, Indiana and Chicago are guaranteed playoff teams, that leaves 4 spots for the rest of the East to fight for. If NY/Brooklyn/Philly/Toronto all split their divisional games, while teams like Milwaukee (Detroit & Cleveland) and Atlanta (Charlotte, Washington & Orlando) feast on their much weaker divisional opponents, it could make it hard for more than 2/4 Atlantic division teams to make the playoffs (despite some hype that 3 or even all 4, if Toronto suprises, could make the playoffs).

We play a not completely but still slightly unbalanced schedule (at least within the conference). That means that while the Hawks may play the Heat one more time than us, they will likely play the bobcats, wizards and magic at least three more times. That might not be much but as we often see. ahem...Harrison Barnes...ahem, the end of the season often comes down to percentage points.

Every team plays every team atleast twice, their conference opponents atleast 3 times and no teams plays another more than 4 times.

So every east team plays the west twice. (30 games). That leaves 52 conference games.

Each team plays their division teams 4 times. Thats 16 games. That leaves 36 games left for 10 opponents.

Now I don't know exactly how they break down the rest, but it leaves 4 games against 6 teams and 3 games against the remaining 4.

So the games within conference are fairly well balanced except the Raptors may play 1 game more or less against a 'better' or 'worse' team 4 times.

This year the only east conference teams the Raps play 3 times are Atlanta, Miami, Chicago and Milwaukee

So in the end we see that:

1) division has a very small impact on the schedule
2) the Raps schedule is relatively easy

It was a decent read, but I got the sense that he's hasn't watched the Raptors that much. Which is strange when this is supposed to be a scout's take on it.

I think we'll be in one of the more competitive divisions in the league. No, that doesn't mean that I think we play way more games against them than everyone else. What it means is that first to last will probably be separated by 8-10 games, whereas other divisions you might see a 30 game difference. I think Boston will win this division but I doubt they will win more than 45-47 games. Toronto will probably come in last in the Atlantic but we'll have around 33-34 wins and so the margin will be indicate a more competitive division.

I don't think the author is wrong. We may not have a 50-win team in the division, but we also won't have a whole bunch of teams with losing records. Probably only 2? I'm thinking us and Philly/New York? I can't see both having losing records.. and I don't have a good feel for what New York will be like this year.

Just for your reference, the winning percentages of each division last year:

Central: 0.512
I doubt Chicago will win 75% of its games this year. And the other teams won't be that much more improved than last year so I envision Central dropping below .500.

Atlantic: 0.469
I expect Brooklyn to take a huge jump. They only won a third of their games and I expect them to win more than half this year. That's easily a 20-25% jump in winning percentage, I expect this division to be near or above .500. When was the last time that 4 teams from the same division made the playoffs in the East?!

Southeast: 0.455
Orlando was a .500 team last year and that's going to go south in a big way. Atlanta isn't as good either. Miami will probably be the only team above .400 in that division, and so they're gonna drop big time.

Chandler was hurt Wednesday night in the opening minute of the Knicks' exhibition victory over the Brooklyn Nets when he banged knees in a collision with Gerald Wallace. They are already dealing with injuries in their frontcourt to Amare Stoudemire and Marcus Camby, and Rasheed Wallace still hasn't played while trying to work his way into shape after a two-year retirement.